Douglas Gamley

John Douglas Gamley (13 September 1924 – 5 February 1998), generally known as Douglas Gamley, was an Australian composer, who worked on orchestral arrangements and on local, British and American films.

John Douglas Gamley was born on 13 September 1924 in Melbourne to John McKenzie Gamley and his wife, Helen "Nellie" (nee Patrick). Less than a fortnight later, Nellie died on 26 September 1924.

One of Gamley's early teachers was Waldemar Seidel in Melbourne. In September 1944 Gamley appeared as a solo pianist with the ABC Symphony Orchestra at the Melbourne Town Hall. His performance was described by The Argus' reviewer: he "showed brilliance" including his effort on "Liszt's A major concerto (No 2) [which] had an assured technique, but can still go a long way before his powers as an interpreter of his composer are fully used." In November of that year, as a student at the Melbourne Conservatorium of Music, he played piano alongside Ann Molan on violin for César Franck's Sonata for Violin and Pianoforte and Édouard Lalo's Symphonie espagnole.

Gamley was particularly influenced by Modest Mussorgsky, creating a full orchestral version of his Pictures at an Exhibition, and adapting his Night on Bald Mountain for his score for the horror feature film, Asylum (1972). David Nice reviewed "The Bogatyr (Heroes') Gate at Kiev" from Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition and felt that "few have gone quite as far as the brilliant Australian-born arranger and film-score composer [Gamley]", and that he provided "a happier meeting" with Mussorgsky's work than that in Asylum. Gamley adapted Gabriel Fauré's Pavane for The Monster Club (1980).

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